Dobson, H.J. orcid.org/0000-0003-3124-8546 and Rose, C. (2018) The afterlives of post-war Japanese prime ministers. Journal of Contemporary Asia, 49 (1). pp. 127-150. ISSN 0047-2336
Abstract
Despite growing interest over the last twenty years in the position and power of the Japanese prime minister, what he does after resigning from this position has been overlooked in the extant literatures in both English and Japanese. This is unfortunate because, to paraphrase President Bill Clinton, as an ex-leader “you lose your power but not your influence.” This article represents the first attempt to explore what postwar Japanese prime ministers have done after stepping down and what influence they have continued to exert. It does so by providing an empirical overview of the afterlives of Japan’s thirty-three postwar ex-prime ministers before then discussing the benefits and shortcomings of applying the comparative, conceptual literature on the role of former leaders in Western democracies to the specific case of Japan. After providing the necessary justification, it then focuses on three detailed and illuminating case studies of Nakasone Yasuhiro, Murayama Tomiichi and Fukuda Yasuo. It argues that Japanese prime ministers continue to exert influence in a number of informal ways.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | © 2018 The Author(s). Published by Journal of Contemporary Asia. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. |
Keywords: | Japan; Prime Minister; ex-leaders; power; influence; informal politics |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of Sheffield |
Academic Units: | The University of Sheffield > Faculty of Social Sciences (Sheffield) > School of East Asian Studies (Sheffield) |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Sheffield |
Date Deposited: | 25 Oct 2017 11:42 |
Last Modified: | 12 Apr 2024 15:05 |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | Taylor & Francis (Routledge) |
Refereed: | Yes |
Identification Number: | 10.1080/00472336.2018.1460389 |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:122957 |